Well! by this time I was awake to the realities of time, place, and
circumstance. The palace and its spells, the impracticable despot, the
impassible premier, were not the phantasms of a witching night, but the
hard facts of noonday. Here were the very Apollyons of paganry in the
way, and only the Great Hearts of a lonely woman and a loving child to
challenge them.
With a heart heavy with regret for the comparatively happy home I had
left in Malacca, I sought an interview with the Kralahome, and told him
(through his secretary, Mr. Hunter) how impossible it would be for me
and my child to lodge within the walls of the Grand Palace; and that he
was bound in honor to make good the conditions on which I had been
induced to leave Singapore. At last I succeeded in interesting him, and
he accorded me a gracious hearing. My objection to the palace, as a
place of residence as well as of business, seemed to strike him as
reasonable enough; and he promised to plead my cause with his Majesty,
bidding me kindly "give myself no further trouble about the matter, for
he would make it right."
Thus passed a few days more, while I waited monotonously under the roof
of the premier, teaching Boy, studying Siamese, paying stated visits to
the good Koon Ying Phan, and suffering tumultuous invasions from my
"intimate enemies" of the harem, who came upon us like a flight of
locusts, and rarely left without booty, in the shape of trifles they had
begged of me. But things get themselves done, after a fashion, even in
Siam; and so, one morning, came the slow but welcome news that the king
was reconciled to the idea of my living outside the palace, that a house
had been selected for me, and a messenger waited to conduct me to it.
Hastily donning our walking-gear, we found an elderly man, of somewhat
sinister aspect, in a dingy red coat with faded facings of yellow,
impatient to guide us to our unimaginable quarters. As we passed out, we
met the premier, whose countenance wore a quizzing expression, which I
afterward understood; but at the moment I saw in it only the
characteristic conundrum that I had neither the time nor the talent to
guess. It was with a lively sense of relief that I followed our
conductor, in whom, by a desperate exploit of imagination, I discovered
a promise of privacy and "home."
In a long, slender boat, with a high, uneven covering of wood, we stowed
ourselves in the Oriental manner, my dress and appearance affording
infinite amusement to the ten rowers as they plied their paddles, while
our escort stood in the entrance chewing betel, and looking more
ill-omened than ever. We alighted at the king's pavilion facing the
river, and were led, by a long, circuitous, and unpleasant road, through
two tall gates, into a street which, from the offensive odors that
assailed us, I took to be a fish-market. The sun burned, the air
stifled, the dust choked us, the ground blistered our feet; we were
parching and suffocating, when our guide stopped at the end of this most
execrable lane, and signed to us to follow him up three broken steps of
brick. From a pouch in his dingy coat he produced a key, applied it to a
door, and opened to us two small rooms, without a window in either,
without a leaf to shade, without bath-closet or kitchen. And this was
the residence sumptuously appointed for the English governess to the
royal family of Siam!
And furnished! and garnished! In one room, on a remnant of filthy
matting, stood the wreck of a table, superannuated, and maimed of a leg,
but propped by two chairs that with broken arms sympathized with each
other. In the other, a cheap excess of Chinese bedstead, that took the
whole room to itself; and a mattress!--a mutilated epitome of a
Lazarine hospital.
My stock of Siamese words was small, but strong. I gratefully recalled
the emphatic monosyllables wherewith the premier's sister had so berated
me; and turning upon the king's messenger with her tremendous _my di! my
di!_ dashed the key from his hand, as, inanely grinning, he held it out
to me, caught my boy up in my arms, cleared the steps in a bound, and
fled anywhere, anywhere, until I was stopped by the crowd of men, women,
and children, half naked, who gathered around me, wondering. Then,
remembering my adventure with the chain-gang, I was glad to accept the
protection of my insulted escort, and escape from that suburb of
disgust. All the way back to the premier's our guide grinned at us
fiendishly, whether in token of apology or ridicule I knew not; and
landing us safely, he departed to our great relief, still grinning.
Straight went I to the Kralahome, whose shy, inquisitive smile was more
and more provoking. In a few sharp words I told him, through the
interpreter, what I thought of the lodging provided for me, and that
nothing should induce me to live in such a slum. To which, with cool,
deliberate audacity, he replied that nothing prevented me from living
where I was. I started from the low seat I had taken (in order to
converse with him at my ease, he sitting on the floor), and not without
difficulty found voice to say that neither his palace nor the den in the
fish-market would suit me, and that I demanded suitable and independent
accommodations, in a respectable neighborhood, for myself and my child.
My rage only amused him. Smiling insolently, he rose, bade me, "Never
mind: it will be all right by and by," and retired to an inner chamber.
My head throbbed with pain, my pulse bounded, my throat burned. I
staggered to my rooms, exhausted and despairing, there to lie, for
almost a week, prostrated with fever, and tortured day and night with
frightful fancies and dreams. Beebe and the gentle Koon Ying Phan nursed
me tenderly, bringing me water, deliciously cool, in which the fragrant
flower of the jessamine had been steeped, both to drink and to bathe my
temples. As soon as I began to recover, I caressed the soft hand of the
dear pagan lady, and implored her, partly in Siamese, partly in English,
to intercede for me with her husband, that a decent home might be
provided for us. She assured me, while she smoothed my hair and patted
my cheek as though I were a helpless child, that she would do her best
with him, begging me meanwhile to be patient. But that I could not be;
and I spared no opportunity to expostulate with the premier on the
subject of my future abode and duties, telling him that the life I was
leading under his roof was insupportable to me; though, indeed, I was
not ungrateful for the many offices of affection I received from the
ladies of his harem, who in my trouble were sympathetic and tender. From
that time forth the imperturbable Kralahome was ever courteous to me.
Nevertheless, when from time to time I grew warm again on the
irrepressible topic, he would smile slyly, tap the ashes from his pipe,
and say, "Yes, sir! Never mind, sir! You not like, you can live in
fish-market, sir!" The apathy and supineness of these people oppressed
me intolerably. Never well practised in patience, I chafed at the
_sang-froid_ of the deliberate premier. Without compromising my dignity,
I did much to enrage him; but he bore all with a _nonchalance_ that was
the more irritating because it was not put on.
Thus more than two months passed, and I had desperately settled down to
my Oriental studies, content to snub the Kralahome with his own
indifference, whilst he, on the other hand, blandly ignored our
existence, when, to my surprise, he paid me a visit one afternoon,
complimented me on my progress in the language, and on my "great
heart,"--or _chi yai_, as he called it,--and told me his Majesty was
highly incensed at my conduct in the affair of the fish-market, and
that he had found me something to do. I thanked him so cordially that he
expressed his surprise, saying, "Siamese lady no like work; love play,
love sleep. Why you no love play?"
I assured him that I liked play well enough when I was in the humor for
play; but that at present I was not disposed to disport myself, being
weary of my life in his palace, and sick of Siam altogether. He received
my candor with his characteristic smile and a good-humored "Good by,
sir!"
Next morning ten Siamese lads and a little girl came to my room. The
former were the half-brothers, nephews, and other "encumbrances" of the
Kralahome; the latter their sister, a simple child of nine or ten.
Surely it was with no snobbery of condescension that I received these
poor children, but rather gratefully, as a comfort and a wholesome
discipline.
And so another month went by, and still I heard nothing from his
Majesty. But the premier began to interest me. The more I saw of him the
more he puzzled me. It was plain that all who came in contact with him
both feared and loved him. He displayed a kind of passive amiability of
which he seemed always conscious, which he made his _forte_. By what
means he exacted such prompt obedience, and so completely controlled a
people whom he seemed to drive with reins so loose and careless, was a
mystery to me. But that his influence and the prestige of his name
penetrated to every nook of that vast yet undeveloped kingdom was the
phenomenon which slowly but surely impressed me. I was but a passing
traveller, surveying from a distance and at large that vast plain of
humanity; but I could see that it was systematically tilled by one
master mind.